Articles, guides & resources

23 Sept 2026 · 5 min read

Lightning Lesson: Coordination Cost Discovery for Engineering Leaders

A simple mapping exercise turns "coordination feels expensive" into a number. In one example, redesigning team boundaries around the outcome cut the cost from 38 to 2.

Leadership

Giuseppe De Simone

27 Apr 2026 · 3 min read

What Happens When You Invest in Your Leadership: A Conversation with Maja Lovrenčić

What does leadership growth really look like from the inside? Giuseppe De Simone talks with Maja Lovrenčić, Coach and Leader at Avery Dennison, about the shift from firefighting to designing.

Change Management

Giuseppe De Simone

19 Apr 2026 · 3 min read

Start Strong, Finish Better: AI for Scrum Events That Deliver

Tired of sprints that start slow or end without impact? This webinar with Giuseppe De Simone and Gregory Keegan shows how AI can transform your sprint planning, retrospectives, and coaching conversations.

Change Management

Giuseppe De Simone

2 Apr 2026 · 3 min read

Why Organizations Struggle with Change and How to Build Adaptive Ones

Tired of change initiatives that fizzle out? This webinar with Nino Zeljko explores why organizations struggle with change, and how to build genuinely adaptive ones.

Change Management

Nino Zeljko

7 Feb 2026 · 1 min read

The Hidden Ways Leaders Shape the Teams Around Them

Your behaviour as a leader shapes your team's culture whether you intend it to or not. This webinar with Bent Myllerup and Giuseppe De Simone examines the psychodynamics of leadership, the part most leadership development programmes quietly skip.

Change Management

Bent Myllerup

28 Jan 2026 · 2 min read

How Product Owners Can Use AI Without Losing the Plot

Product Owners spend a disproportionate amount of time on low-value administrative work. This webinar shows practical AI techniques for automating the repetitive so POs can focus on the conversations, decisions, and strategic thinking that actually need them.

Change Management

Giuseppe De Simone

27 Dec 2025 · 3 min read

Your Biggest AI Challenge Isn't Technical. It's Cultural.

Most organisations treat AI adoption as an engineering problem. That framing almost guarantees limited results. Whether an initiative succeeds is determined far more by how people respond to uncertainty than by the quality of the technology.

Change Management

Javier Perez Fernandez

18 Dec 2025 · 3 min read

What the AI Adoption Events in Madrid Didn't Talk About

After attending several AI adoption events organised by the Madrid Chamber of Commerce, Javier Perez Fernandez left with a consistent feeling: the most important conversation was not happening. Here are the challenges he believes organisations need to address honestly.

Change Management

Javier Perez Fernandez

4 Dec 2025 · 2 min read

State of Agile - A Brutally Honest Conversation

Agile has been declared dead more times than anyone can count. Yet its principles, adaptability, collaboration, and customer focus, are more relevant than ever.

Change Management

Bent Myllerup

29 Oct 2025 · 2 min read

What HR Looks Like When It's Actually Agile

Most HR functions know what agile means in theory. Far fewer have figured out what it means for how they actually work. This webinar with Giuseppe De Simone examines what genuinely agile HR looks like.

Change Management

Giuseppe De Simone

1 Jul 2025 · 1 min read

Flight Levels in Action - Konrad Pogorzala at Agile Boston

In this recorded webinar, Konrad Pogorzala shows how Flight Levels create alignment and transparency across organisational levels, from operational teams to executive leadership. Practical, case-study-grounded, and worth your time.

Flight Levels

Konrad Pogorzala

8 Mar 2025 · 3 min read

Why the Best Leaders Think Differently, and What We Can Learn from Female Competencies

Leadership selection has a persistent bias problem: we promote confidence and mistake it for competence. The traits that actually drive results, empathy, humility, clear communication, are more commonly found in women. That needs to change.

Leadership

Bent Myllerup

19 Jan 2025 · 3 min read

The Strategy Translation Canvas: A Tool for Closing the Gap Between Vision and Execution

A strategy sitting in a deck is an aspiration, not a plan. The Strategy Translation Canvas breaks strategic intent into specific, owned, measurable actions that connect to the work being done every day.

Change Management

Jan B. Olsen

2 Jan 2025 · 3 min read

Why Most Strategies Fail Between the Slides and the Doing

Between two thirds and three quarters of large organisations struggle to turn their strategic plans into operational reality. The plans are often good. The implementation is where things fall apart. Here is a structured approach to the gap.

Change Management

Jan B. Olsen

9 Oct 2024 · 3 min read

The Start-Up That Said Agile Didn't Work, and Then Changed Its Mind

A 45-person start-up in targeted advertising had tried Scrum for two years and concluded it was useless. The solution wasn't more Agile theory. It was focus on the organisational challenges, and deliberately push the approach to the back seat.

Flight Levels

Russell Hill

19 Jul 2024 · 3 min read

Ten Reasons Sprint Goals Are Worth the Effort

Sprint Goals are one of Scrum's most underused elements. Teams skip them, treat them as afterthoughts, or confuse them with task lists. Here is why that is a mistake, and what your team actually gains when you use them properly.

Coaching

Niels Verdonk

6 Jul 2024 · 3 min read

Difficult Conversations: A Leader's Practical Guide to Saying the Hard Thing Well

Difficult conversations are not a test of courage. They are a test of preparation, clarity, and emotional composure. Most leaders avoid them or handle them badly. Here is a structured approach that makes them more productive and less damaging.

Leadership

Bent Myllerup

30 Jun 2024 · 2 min read

Despite All the Mishaps: Show Me the Better Option!

This is the final blog post in my series about mishaps in applying Agile. Agile mishap #1: Do it by the book! Agile mishap #2: All frameworks are wrong but mine Agile mishap #3: The Agile...

Agile

Bent Myllerup

15 Jun 2024 · 3 min read

Agile Mishap #5: The Certification Circus

A full disclosure upfront: Bent Myllerup is a Certified Scrum Trainer who has spent twelve years certifying people in Agile. Which makes this critique of the certification industry both more uncomfortable to write and more worth reading.

Agile

Bent Myllerup

9 Jun 2024 · 3 min read

Boogie and Backlogs: The Hilarious Parallels Between Agile and Disco

The year I was a sprightly 12-year-old, rocking my bell-bottoms and boogying down to the pulsating beats of disco. It was a year of glitter, grooves, and glorious gaffes.

Agile

Bent Myllerup

8 Jun 2024 · 3 min read

Agile Leadership: The Vital Role of Sensemaking, Integrity, Presence, and Authenticity

Introduction At the Regional Scrum Gathering in Ghent on June 6th and 7th, 2024, I had the privilege of presenting on the critical elements of agile leadership.

Leadership

Bent Myllerup

4 Jun 2024 · 3 min read

The Unseen Potential of Scrum Masters: Future Leaders in a Time of Uncertainty

In recent times, there has been an unfortunate pattern of laying off Scrum Masters - especially in financial institutions. On the surface, this may seem like a cost-cutting measure.

Leadership

Bent Myllerup

28 May 2024 · 3 min read

What an Agile Coach Actually Needs to Be Good At

Most Agile coaches know frameworks well. The ones who create durable change also understand human dynamics, trust, status, psychodynamics, and the irrational ways people actually behave. Process knowledge is necessary. It is not sufficient.

Coaching

Bent Myllerup

29 Apr 2024 · 3 min read

The Pacesetter Trap: What Happens When One Leadership Style Runs Everything

Alyssa is brilliant, driven, and has built a successful software company. She is also quietly running her team into the ground. Her story illustrates what Goleman's research on leadership styles has shown for decades.

Leadership

Joanne Perold

25 Apr 2024 · 3 min read

Flight Levels in Practice: The Five Activities That Make It Work

Flight Levels is a thinking model for organisational agility, not a process framework. Its five key activities, define outcomes, visualise, create focus, establish interactions, improve, are what translate the thinking into actual change.

Flight Levels

Russell Hill

25 Apr 2024 · 3 min read

From 50 to 350 People and Everything Started Breaking: A Flight Levels Case Study

An online legal services company grew from 50 to 350 people in three years and hit a wall. Technical outages were frequent, priorities were unclear, and coordination between teams had broken down. Here is how Flight Levels changed the picture.

Flight Levels

Russell Hill

24 Apr 2024 · 3 min read

Why Flight Levels Isn't a Framework, and Why That Matters

Flight Levels is frequently described alongside Scrum and SAFe as an agile framework. It isn't, and the distinction is important. It's a thinking model for designing the coordination systems your organisation actually needs.

Flight Levels

Russell Hill

19 Apr 2024 · 2 min read

Book Review: Rethinking Agile by Klaus Leopold

Klaus Leopold's short, sharp book makes one argument and makes it well: excellent team-level agility does not produce business agility. They are different problems that require different solutions, and most organisations are only solving one of them.

Flight Levels

Russell Hill

16 Apr 2024 · 3 min read

Humble Inquiry - The Art of Elevating Your Employees

Effective leadership is often associated with qualities such as decisiveness, confidence, and assertiveness. However, there's another, often overlooked trait that can be equally - if not more - valuable in driving organisational success: humble inquiry.

Leadership

Bent Myllerup

27 Mar 2024 · 2 min read

Book Review: Thinking, Fast and Slow. Still the Most Useful Book About Decisions You'll Read

Daniel Kahneman's Nobel Prize-winning work on human judgement has never been more relevant. In a world awash with data, AI, and algorithmic recommendations, understanding how our own thinking is wired, and where it reliably misleads us, is foundational.

Agile

Joanne Perold

24 Mar 2024 · 2 min read

Agile Mishap #4: Incompetent Coaches and Trainers

In the journey to understand what went wrong with Agile, we must confront a critical issue plaguing its implementation: the prevalence of incompetent coaches and trainers.

Coaching

Bent Myllerup

5 Mar 2024 · 1 min read

Review: "Humanocracy: Creating Organizations as Amazing as the People Inside Them"

In "Humanocracy: Creating Organizations as Amazing as the People Inside Them," Gary Hamel and Michele Zanini offer a thought-provoking critique of traditional bureaucratic structures prevalent in medium to large-scale organisations.

Change Management

Bent Myllerup

21 Feb 2024 · 2 min read

Agile mishap #3: The Agile Bubble

In a series of blog posts I am discussing the question: If it is not dead then what went wrong with Agile? In 2019, I had the experience of attending two conferences in a row.

Agile

Bent Myllerup

6 Feb 2024 · 3 min read

Agile Mishap #2: All frameworks are wrong but mine

In a series of blog posts I am discussing the question: If it is not dead then what went wrong with Agile? Have you noticed the increasing numbers of Agile frameworks that have emerged over the past years?

Agile

Bent Myllerup

6 Feb 2024 · 1 min read

Agile Retrospectives, Second Edition: A Practical Guide for Catalyzing Team Learning and Improvement

The first version of Agile Retrospectives was my guide for running retrospectives for a decade. Imagine my excitement when Esther and Diana let me know that they were going to do a second edition and that...

Coaching

Joanne Perold

10 Jan 2024 · 3 min read

The Culture That Got You Here Probably Won't Get You There

The culture that wins early adopters is often incompatible with what the mainstream demands. Geoffrey Moore described the market chasm. This piece examines the cultural shift required to cross it, and why leaders miss it until it's too late.

Change Management

Garbrand van der Molen

9 Jan 2024 · 1 min read

What is Organisational Culture?

Organisational culture encompasses the shared values, beliefs, and practices that define how individuals within an organization interact and work together. It reflects the company's identity, influences decision-making, and shapes employee behaviour.

Leadership

Garbrand van der Molen

8 Jan 2024 · 3 min read

Agile Mishap #1: Do it by the book!

In a series of blog posts I am discussing the question: What went wrong with Agile? When I started applying Agile methodologies in 2006 there was one dominant framework.

Change Management

Bent Myllerup

3 Jan 2024 · 3 min read

Organisational Change Doesn't Happen Collectively. It Happens Person by Person

The most overlooked insight in Cameron and Quinn's classic work on organisational culture is not the Competing Values Framework. It is the appendix. The real tool for change agents is the Management Skills Assessment Instrument, which makes transformation personal.

Change Management

Garbrand van der Molen

1 Jan 2024 · 3 min read

What Went Wrong with Agile? An Honest Reckoning

Agile is not dead. But it has been badly misused, cynically marketed, and routinely applied in ways that contradict its own principles. This post opens a series examining what actually went wrong, and why it matters.

Change Management

Bent Myllerup

19 Dec 2023 · 3 min read

Why Developers Build the Wrong Thing, and How User Stories Help

A WhatsApp message that counts how long you have been waiting instead of how long you have left. A small, telling example of what happens when developers build exactly what was specified, and the specification missed what the user actually needed.

Product Development

Niels Verdonk

30 Nov 2023 · 3 min read

The Question Behind the Question: Karl Tomm's Map for Coaches

Most coaches think about what to ask. The better skill is knowing what kind of question to ask, and when. Karl Tomm's four-quadrant model gives you a strategic framework rather than a deck of cards to memorise.

Coaching

Bent Myllerup

28 Nov 2023 · 3 min read

What Flight Levels Actually Means, and Where the Name Comes From

Flight Levels comes up constantly in conversations about organisational agility. For anyone meeting the term for the first time, here's the plain explanation, starting with the name.

Flight Levels

Russell Hill

21 Nov 2023 · 3 min read

Developing Your Unique Leadership Style

This is my third and final post in the mini-series about management and leadership. In addition to this post, the series include: Management Is Not Leadership and Me-Dership Is Not Leadership Either – A Critical Lens...

Leadership

Bent Myllerup

1 Nov 2023 · 3 min read

Me-dership is not Leadership Either - A Critical Lens on Idealised Leadership

This is my second blog post in a series that addresses what leadership is and is not. The third and final blog post: Developing Your Unique Leadership Style is also available.

Leadership

Bent Myllerup

28 Oct 2023 · 3 min read

Management Is Not Leadership, and Confusing the Two Costs Organisations Dearly

Management and leadership are not the same activity, and treating them as interchangeable has real consequences. This post opens a series on what leadership actually requires, starting with the distinction that most organisations still do not make clearly enough.

Leadership

Bent Myllerup

18 Oct 2023 · 2 min read

The Synergy of Lean Thinking in the Agile Landscape

In the ever-evolving realm of business management, the amalgamation of Lean Thinking with Agile Product Development has become a catalyst for organizations striving to achieve operational excellence and deliver unparalleled value to their customers.

Agile

Niels Verdonk

14 Oct 2023 · 2 min read

5 books every scrum professional should read

The Agile and Scrum frameworks have gained significant traction in the business world, revolutionizing how projects are managed and products are delivered. To stay competitive, professionals need to invest in continuous learning.

Agile

Bent Myllerup

14 Oct 2023 · 3 min read

Best Scrum Tools to use in 2024

At Better Change we understand the importance of utilising effective tools to enhance collaboration, improve productivity, and streamline project management. Whether you're a seasoned Sc rum Master or just starting your agile journey.

Scrum

14 Oct 2023 · 3 min read

Fostering Team Synergy, Overcoming Dysfunctions, and Building Strong Teams

Synergy is the magic that turns a group of individuals into a high-performing team. It springs from the shared goal or purpose that binds team members together.

Coaching

Bent Myllerup

14 Oct 2023 · 3 min read

Forming, Storming, Norming, Performing: Tuckman's Map Through Team Development

Bruce Tuckman's model of team development is more than fifty years old and still more useful than most of what has replaced it. Here is what the four stages actually mean, and how to navigate each of them.

Leadership

Niels Verdonk

13 Oct 2023 · 2 min read

The Scrum Guide

In the realm of agile project management, the Scrum Guide stands as a crucial framework, providing a set of principles and guidelines that empower teams to deliver value through adaptive solutions.

Agile

Niels Verdonk

13 Oct 2023 · 3 min read

Scrum's Five Values: The Human Foundation Under the Framework

Scrum's five values, courage, focus, commitment, respect, and openness, are easy to list and easy to ignore. Teams that take them seriously look fundamentally different from teams that treat them as decorative.

Agile

Niels Verdonk

13 Oct 2023 · 3 min read

What is an Agile Release Train

Agile Methodology usually starts with small teams that are focused on contributing elements to the project. Typically, a need eventually arises for long-lasting.

Agile

Gregor Heidinger

13 Oct 2023 · 3 min read

Estimation in Scrum: What It's For, How to Do It, and When to Question It

Estimation in Scrum is not about predicting the future with precision. It is about having useful conversations about complexity, surfacing unknowns, and making the work manageable. Planning Poker is the most widely used technique. Here is why it works.

Scrum

13 Oct 2023 · 2 min read

SAFe: A Practical Introduction to Scaling Agile Across the Enterprise

SAFe is one of the most widely adopted approaches for applying agile at enterprise scale. Here is what it is, how it works, and what you need to understand before deciding whether it is the right fit for your organisation.

Agile

Gregor Heidinger

10 Oct 2023 · 2 min read

Embrace the complexity of team dynamics with the Plausibility Canvas

Do you often find yourself in situations where you're trying to influence an team's direction, only to be met with unpredictable outcomes? The world of Agile coaching is a complex and ever-changing landscape, and success can sometimes seem elusive.

Coaching

Bent Myllerup

30 Sept 2023 · 3 min read

The Art of Listening and Unlocking Hidden Potentials

Real listening is rarer in coaching conversations than most people assume, and it's often what actually unlocks a client's own thinking, more than any technique or question ever could.

Coaching

Bent Myllerup

21 Sept 2023 · 1 min read

Scrum Roles

At the centre of each Scrum is a small team of people called the Scrum Team. The Scrum Team is made up of three key accountabilities which include the Scrum Master .

Scrum

Gregor Heidinger

19 Sept 2023 · 3 min read

Training Without Coaching Is Theory. Coaching Without Training Is Guesswork.

Training gives people frameworks and vocabulary. Coaching helps them apply those frameworks in their specific context. Neither alone produces the lasting change that both together can achieve, and most organisations systematically underinvest in the combination.

Coaching

Niels Verdonk

31 Aug 2023 · 3 min read

Navigating the Terrain - Agile Coaching vs. Systemic Coaching

Agile coaching and systemic coaching are often treated as interchangeable. They're not, and knowing the difference changes which one is actually useful in a given moment.

Coaching

Bent Myllerup

21 Aug 2023 · 2 min read

Planning Poker

Estimation is probably one of the most controversial topics in the Agile domain. The reason is likely related to assumptions about what these estimations are going to be used for.

Agile

Anders Højgaard Nielsen

12 Aug 2023 · 1 min read

Protecting the Hedgehogs

Regrettably, the hedgehog population is experiencing a decline due to challenges in their habitat. To address this, Denmark is observing an initiative today where we are conducting a hedgehog population census to enhance our understanding of these creatures.

Change Management

Bent Myllerup

31 Jul 2023 · 3 min read

The Power of Systemic Coaching in Change Management

Change management usually focuses on the plan and the process. Systemic coaching focuses on the relationships and patterns underneath, which is often where change actually succeeds or fails.

Coaching

Bent Myllerup

19 Jul 2023 · 3 min read

OKRs: Ambitious Goals, Honest Numbers, and Why 70% Is Actually Fine

OKRs, Objectives and Key Results, are a goal-setting system built on a counterintuitive premise: if you are always hitting your goals, they are too easy.

Coaching

Jan B. Olsen

31 May 2023 · 2 min read

Agile vs Scrum: Clearing Up the Confusion Once and for All

Agile and Scrum are not competing approaches, not synonyms, and not interchangeable. Agile is a philosophy. Scrum is one of many methods for applying that philosophy. Understanding the difference makes both more useful.

Agile

31 May 2023 · 3 min read

Kanban Boards: More Than Sticky Notes in Columns

A Kanban board is more than sticky notes in columns. Understanding how the board supports flow management, not just task tracking, is what separates teams that get real results from teams that just have a tidy wall.

Kanban

Konrad Pogorzala

31 May 2023 · 3 min read

The Product Owner: Running a Business Within a Business

The Product Owner is accountable for the value the Scrum Team delivers. In practice, that means managing one of the most demanding roles in the framework, part business strategist, part customer advocate, part decision-maker under pressure.

Scrum

Heidi Reidel Sørensen

3 Apr 2023 · 3 min read

Story Points: What They Are, What They're Not, and How to Use Them Well

Story points are a relative measure of effort and complexity, not hours, not days, not a commitment. Teams that misunderstand this tend to use them badly. Here is what story points actually are and why Planning Poker works.

Agile

Jan B. Olsen

21 Mar 2023 · 3 min read

Five Reasons Coaching Cultures Fail, and They're Not What You Think

Creating a coaching culture is one of the most frequently stated leadership development goals, and one of the most frequently failing ones. The reasons tend not to be what organisations expect.

Coaching

3 Mar 2023 · 2 min read

Lean vs Agile: What They Share, Where They Differ, and Why It Actually Matters

Lean and Agile are regularly conflated, used interchangeably, or treated as competing philosophies. They are none of those things. Understanding what distinguishes them makes you better at using both.

Agile

Joanne Perold

12 Jan 2023 · 2 min read

Scrum vs Kanban: Why the Question Is Based on a Flawed Premise

Scrum or Kanban? It is the most common question in Agile training, and the wrong one. The Kanban Method is not a delivery framework competing with Scrum. It is a change management approach that works alongside whatever your teams do now.

Kanban

Russell Hill

20 Dec 2022 · 3 min read

Kanban: One Word, Three Completely Different Meanings

Ask ten people what Kanban means and you'll get at least three different answers, and they'll all be correct. The confusion is baked in, because the word genuinely refers to three distinct things.

Kanban

Russell Hill

2 Dec 2022 · 3 min read

The Skills That Actually Make a Product Owner Effective

The Product Owner role is more demanding than most job descriptions suggest. The mechanics are learnable. The judgment, communication, and stakeholder navigation that make those mechanics work are considerably harder.

Product Development

Niels Verdonk

20 Oct 2022 · 2 min read

What is the Definition of Done?

The Definition of Done (DoD) is a crucial concept in agile methodologies, particularly in Scrum, acting as a comprehensive checklist that outlines the criteria each product backlog item must meet to be considered complete.

Scrum

Bent Myllerup

8 Oct 2022 · 2 min read

Dual Track Agile: Discover and Deliver at the Same Time

Dual Track Agile separates discovery, the work of figuring out what to build, from delivery, the work of building it. Running both tracks simultaneously sounds complicated, but it solves a real problem that single-track teams constantly bump into.

Agile

8 Oct 2022 · 3 min read

Product Owner vs Scrum Master

Two roles that are often confused in Scrum are the Product Owner and the Scrum Master . Although the two collaborate and interact with each other.

Scrum

Joanne Perold

8 Oct 2022 · 3 min read

Product Owner vs Scrum Master: Two Accountabilities That Should Never Be Combined

The Product Owner and Scrum Master are the two most frequently confused roles in Scrum. They interact closely, they both care about team effectiveness, and they are fundamentally different in what they are accountable for. Here is the distinction that matters.

Scrum

Heidi Reidel Sørensen

8 Oct 2022 · 3 min read

What are the Three Pillars of Scrum?

Understanding the Three Pillars of Scrum is important in order for Agile teams to maximise the use of the Scrum Framework. The three Scrum Pillars are as follows: Transparency: This is ensuring everyone in the team...

Scrum

Bent Myllerup

8 Oct 2022 · 3 min read

User Stories - the Clue Is in the Name

User Stories are not a requirements format. They are a conversation starter. The distinction sounds minor but it changes how you write them, how you use them, and how much value your team actually gets from them.

Agile

Javier Perez Fernandez

8 Oct 2022 · 3 min read

Scrum Capacity Planning: How Much Can the Team Actually Do This Sprint?

Capacity planning answers one question: given who is available and for how long, how much work can this team realistically commit to? Getting this right is the foundation of realistic Sprint commitments and sustainable pace.

Scrum

Konrad Pogorzala

2 Sept 2022 · 3 min read

Agile Methodology and Frameworks: What the Umbrella Actually Covers

Agile is not one thing. It is a philosophy implemented through many different frameworks. Understanding what the Manifesto actually says, and how Scrum and Kanban translate it, is the foundation for using any of them well.

Agile

2 Sept 2022 · 3 min read

The Agile Manifesto: Four Values, Twelve Principles, and Why It Still Holds Up

Written in 2001, the Agile Manifesto's four values and twelve principles remain the clearest statement of what Agile actually means, and why the approach consistently outperforms traditional project management in complex, uncertain work.

Agile

Anders Højgaard Nielsen

2 Sept 2022 · 1 min read

Scrum Meetings

In Scrum there are meetings which are an opportunity for teams, management and stakeholders to align. There are four main types of meetings which we call Scrum Events (sometimes also referred to as Scrum ceremonies) that teams participate in.

Scrum

Niels Verdonk

2 Sept 2022 · 3 min read

Burndown Charts: A Practical Guide to Sprint and Release Tracking

Burndown charts show remaining work and whether the current pace will get the team there on time. The Sprint Burndown helps Developers navigate a Sprint. The Release Burndown helps the Product Owner manage the longer delivery arc.

Scrum

Konrad Pogorzala

2 Sept 2022 · 3 min read

The Product Increment: Scrum's Most Important Artefact

The Product Increment is the sum of everything completed so far, every Sprint's delivered work, combined into something usable. It is the most important artefact in Scrum because it is the evidence that the team is delivering value, not...

Scrum

2 Sept 2022 · 3 min read

The Scrum Sprint: Short, Fixed, Continuous, and More Consequential Than It Looks

The Sprint is the heartbeat of Scrum, a fixed-length container within which all other events happen and value is created. Getting Sprints right improves everything else. Getting them wrong corrupts everything else.

Scrum

Anders Højgaard Nielsen

2 Sept 2022 · 3 min read

Epics in Agile: How Large Pieces of Work Get Organised and Delivered

An Epic is a large chunk of work that cannot be completed in a single Sprint. It spans multiple iterations and eventually decomposes into the user stories and backlog items that drive day-to-day delivery.

Agile

Joanne Perold

2 Sept 2022 · 3 min read

What is the Sprint Retrospective?

Sprint Retrospective is a time for teams to reflect on opportunities to improve. The event is dedicated to discussing overall workflow enhancements including individuals, interactions, processes and tools.

Scrum

Bent Myllerup

9 Aug 2022 · 3 min read

What is the Product Backlog?

The Product Backlog in Scrum is a prioritised list of what is needed to improve or develop a product or service. Through this, it maps out the items the Scrum Team must deliver.

Scrum

Javier Perez Fernandez

9 Aug 2022 · 3 min read

Scrum's Three Accountabilities: What They Actually Mean

Scrum does not have roles. It has accountabilities. That distinction is not semantic. Understanding what the Scrum Master, Product Owner, and Developers are actually accountable for, and how those accountabilities interact, is foundational to making Scrum work.

Scrum

Garbrand van der Molen

9 Aug 2022 · 3 min read

Scrum's Five Events: What They Are, What They're For, and How They Connect

Scrum has five events. Most teams run three of them reasonably well and shortchange the other two. Understanding what each event is actually for, not just the mechanics, makes the whole system function more effectively.

Scrum

Joanne Perold

9 Aug 2022 · 3 min read

Scrum's Three Artefacts: What They Are and Why They Matter

The Product Backlog, Sprint Backlog, and Product Increment are the three artefacts of Scrum. They exist to create transparency, a shared understanding of what is being built, what is being worked on, and what has been delivered.

Scrum

9 Aug 2022 · 3 min read

What is Sprint Planning?

Sprint Planning is the first event which kicks off the start of each Sprint. It initiates the Sprint by setting a goal, defining the work that needs to be completed.

Scrum

Niels Verdonk

7 Jul 2022 · 2 min read

Mastering Agile Coaching

According to the State of Agile Coaching Report 2021 only 19% of people who consider themselves to be Agile Coaches has a master level certification in this area.

Coaching

Bent Myllerup

10 Jun 2022 · 3 min read

What Is Scrum? A Straight Answer to the Most Common Question in Agile

Scrum is a framework for tackling complex work in short cycles, built on transparency, inspection, and adaptation. It is not a project management methodology, not a process, and not a synonym for Agile. Here is what it actually is.

Scrum

Bent Myllerup

31 May 2022 · 3 min read

What Is a Scrum Master? More Than a Meeting Facilitator

The Scrum Master is accountable for the effectiveness of the Scrum Team, which makes them a coach, a change agent, and an obstacle-remover, not a meeting facilitator with a fancy title. Here is what the role actually involves.

Scrum

Niels Verdonk

31 May 2022 · 3 min read

The Sprint Review: Not a Presentation, a Conversation

The Sprint Review is where the Scrum Team and stakeholders inspect what was built and decide what comes next. Teams that treat it as a demo and sign-off ceremony miss most of its value.

Scrum

Heidi Reidel Sørensen

8 Mar 2022 · 2 min read

Perspectives on leadership and power

Chris Mowles describes power as the currency of organisational life. It flows through formal hierarchies, informal networks, and unspoken agreements. The German sociologist Norbert Elias argued that power isn’t a fixed possession.

Leadership

Bent Myllerup

12 Sept 2026 · 2 min read

Building Consensus Without Just Averaging Opinions

Genuine consensus is different from a compromise nobody actively objects to. Five practices that build a decision the group actually believes in.

Leadership

11 Sept 2026 · 2 min read

What a Product Vision Is Actually For

A product vision is often written once and rarely referenced again, which suggests it's not really functioning as a vision. What a vision is genuinely supposed to do.

Agile

10 Sept 2026 · 2 min read

What a Kanban Card Should Actually Contain

A Kanban card is easy to treat as a simple sticky-note. What information it actually carries has real consequences for how well the board serves its purpose.

Kanban

7 Sept 2026 · 2 min read

Why Combining Product Owner and Scrum Master Usually Backfires

The Scrum Guide doesn't prohibit one person holding both accountabilities. Why the combination creates structural conflict, and what gets lost specifically.

Scrum

5 Sept 2026 · 2 min read

What Actually Makes an Organisation Agile, Not Just Its Teams

An organisation can have every team running textbook Scrum and still not be, in any meaningful sense, an agile organisation. Conflating the two is why transformations plateau.

Change Management

4 Sept 2026 · 2 min read

Who Is Actually Accountable for a Scrum Team's Performance?

Scrum's accountability structure spreads responsibility for performance across the whole team, resisting the instinct to name a single owner. Understanding why clarifies a lot of confusion.

Scrum

3 Sept 2026 · 2 min read

The Questions That Make a Sprint Review Actually Useful

A Sprint Review's value depends heavily on whether the right questions get asked during it. Seven questions that produce substantive feedback instead of polite nods.

Scrum

30 Aug 2026 · 3 min read

How Decisions Actually Get Made in Management

Most decision-making frameworks describe a process almost no manager actually follows. Here's what separates good management decisions from bad ones in practice, not in theory.

Leadership

28 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

What Timeboxes Are Actually Protecting in Scrum

Every Scrum event's timebox is protecting something specific. Understanding what clarifies why exceeding it consistently is a signal worth investigating, not just an inconvenience.

Scrum

27 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

Mapping the Stakeholders Scrum Doesn't Formally Define

The Scrum Guide defines three accountabilities with precision and says little about the broader circle of stakeholders. Teams have to do this mapping themselves, and skipping it is a quiet source of dysfunction.

Scrum

26 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

What an Iteration Is Actually Buying You

An iteration is a fundamental agile building block. Why time-boxing work at all, rather than working continuously toward a larger goal, is worth being explicit about.

Agile

25 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

Who Actually Owns Technical Debt in Scrum?

Technical debt accumulates because no single Scrum accountability clearly owns it. How the three accountabilities should actually share this responsibility.

Scrum

23 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

Why Agile Transformations Are Organizational, Not Just Procedural

Agile transformation executed as process change consistently under-delivers. What actually needs to change: structure, funding, leadership behavior, and incentives.

Change Management

22 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

What Self-Organization Actually Buys a Scrum Team

Self-organization is often presented as an ideological commitment. The actual case for it is more practical and specific than a values statement, with real limits worth knowing.

Scrum

21 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

Why Change Management Frameworks Struggle With Genuine Complexity

Most established change management frameworks assume a reasonably linear, predictable change. Genuinely complex organisational landscapes strain those assumptions.

Change Management

18 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

Strategies That Actually Enhance Leadership Skills

Communicate more, delegate more, lead by example: true and fairly useless on their own. What actually builds the capability to practice good leadership, not just describe it.

Leadership

17 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

What Good Backlog Refinement Actually Looks Like

Backlog refinement is the Scrum activity most likely to be skipped when time is tight, and the one whose absence causes the most damage two or three sprints later. Six habits that separate refinement that works from refinement that's just ceremony.

Scrum

14 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

What Scrum Masters Actually Owe Product Owners

The Scrum Guide is explicit that the Scrum Master serves the Product Owner, not just the Developers. What that support actually looks like, concretely.

Scrum

13 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

Choosing a Kanban Tool: The Question That Actually Matters

Kanban tool comparisons tend to focus on feature lists. That's not the first question worth asking, and getting the first question wrong makes the feature comparison largely irrelevant.

Kanban

9 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

What Self-Organizing Actually Means in Practice

Self-organizing is often misread as no management structure at all. What it actually means: real authority over how work gets done, bounded by decisions that stay elsewhere.

Agile

7 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

Why Coaching Conversations Need Structure, Not a Script

Unstructured coaching conversations tend to drift. Structure solves this without turning coaching into a rigid script, provided it's held loosely.

Coaching

6 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

Why Cross-Functional Teams Are Harder to Build Than to Define

A cross-functional team's definition is simple: all the skills needed to deliver value, in one team. Actually building one, and keeping it that way, is considerably harder.

Agile

5 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

What a Product Goal Actually Does That a Vision Doesn't

The Product Goal's relationship to a broader product vision is easy to blur. Conflating them produces Product Goals that are either too vague or too narrow to do their job.

Scrum

4 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

AI Projects Worth Starting With

Ambition isn't the constraint for most organizations starting out with AI adoption. Sequencing is: knowing which project to actually attempt first.

AI

3 Aug 2026 · 3 min read

What Scrum Actually Says About Estimates

There's a persistent myth that Scrum requires story points. It doesn't. What the Scrum Guide actually says about estimation, and why some teams are moving away from it entirely.

Scrum

2 Aug 2026 · 2 min read

What Transformational Leadership Actually Requires

Transformational leadership is often reduced to a vague compliment. The four components Burns and Bass actually described, and why strength in three doesn't compensate for a missing fourth.

Leadership

30 Jul 2026 · 3 min read

Six Ways Scrum Masters Become More Effective

Scrum Masters technically doing the role and Scrum Masters genuinely effective in it often look similar day to day. The difference shows up in six specific habits.

Scrum

28 Jul 2026 · 2 min read

What Actually Breaks When a Scrum Team Gets Too Big

Scrum guidance states a recommended team size range without explaining what specifically degrades as a team exceeds it. The actual failure modes explain why the number exists.

Scrum

27 Jul 2026 · 2 min read

What an AI Team Actually Needs (Beyond Data Scientists)

Hiring data scientists first isn't wrong, but it's incomplete: technically excellent models that never get deployed, because the roles that make adoption succeed were never staffed.

AI

26 Jul 2026 · 2 min read

What Agile Actually Requires Financial Organisations to Change

Financial services organisations adopting agile face a specific tension between adaptive, iterative work and regulatory requirements for documentation and audit trails.

Change Management

24 Jul 2026 · 2 min read

The Sprint Planning Mistake Most Teams Don't Notice

Most Sprint Planning advice focuses on mechanics. The more consequential mistakes are less visible than mechanics, and teams that get the mechanics right can still plan badly.

Scrum

22 Jul 2026 · 2 min read

How Scrum Manages Risk Without a Risk Register

Scrum has no risk register, which sometimes reads as Scrum not addressing risk. In practice it manages risk through its structure. What that mechanism catches, and what it doesn't.

Scrum

21 Jul 2026 · 2 min read

Why Group Decisions Often Go Wrong (and How to Fix Them)

Groups are supposed to make better decisions than individuals. In practice they frequently make worse ones. Three failure modes explain why, and four structural fixes address them.

Leadership

18 Jul 2026 · 2 min read

How Agile Project Management Actually Differs From Traditional

Agile project management is sometimes presented as traditional PM done faster. The differences run deeper, touching planning, requirements, and the project manager's role itself.

Agile

17 Jul 2026 · 3 min read

What a Scrum Master's Day Actually Looks Like

The Scrum Master role is often described in terms of accountabilities and outcomes, which doesn't answer what someone in this role actually does between one Daily Scrum and the next.

Scrum

14 Jul 2026 · 2 min read

What a Spike Is Actually For in Scrum

A Spike answers a specific question or reduces a specific uncertainty, rather than delivering product. What makes it different from ordinary backlog work, and when it becomes an excuse to avoid a decision.

Scrum

13 Jul 2026 · 2 min read

What Actually Separates an Agile Coach from a Scrum Master

The two roles overlap enough in day-to-day appearance that the distinction is easy to blur. The genuine difference is in scope, not in the underlying skill set.

Coaching

12 Jul 2026 · 2 min read

What Evidence-Based Management Actually Measures

EBM addresses organizations investing in agile transformation without a clear way to measure whether it's actually working. The four Key Value Areas, and why organizations often measure the wrong things.

Agile

10 Jul 2026 · 2 min read

What a Team Working Agreement Is Actually For

A working agreement is often a one-time exercise that gets filed and forgotten. Done well, it's a living reference that actually resolves the friction it's meant to prevent.

Agile

9 Jul 2026 · 2 min read

A Sprint Planning Checklist Worth Actually Using

Most Sprint Planning checklists just restate the Scrum Guide's mechanical steps. A more useful checklist catches the specific things that go wrong even when those steps are followed correctly.

Scrum

7 Jul 2026 · 2 min read

Why Agile Communication Principles Are Harder Than They Sound

Individuals and interactions over processes and tools is easy to state and surprisingly hard to practice, because most organizational habits pull in the opposite direction.

Agile

5 Jul 2026 · 2 min read

The Feedback Loops Scrum Actually Runs On

Scrum is often described as built around short feedback loops, without being specific about which loops, at which timescales, checking what. Being precise clarifies why Scrum has several distinct ones.

Scrum

4 Jul 2026 · 3 min read

Why Teamwork Is Harder Than It Looks

Teamwork is important is a statement nobody disputes and almost nobody acts on with precision. What specifically breaks down when it fails, and what actually fixes it.

Leadership

3 Jul 2026 · 2 min read

Why Most Impediments Never Get Reported

Scrum assumes impediments get raised. In practice, a substantial share never are, which makes discovery at least as important as solving them once they're found.

Scrum

30 Jun 2026 · 2 min read

Why Team Velocity Swings, and What Actually Stabilizes It

Volatile velocity undermines the forecasting value it's supposed to provide. Velocity swings are usually a symptom. Four common causes, and what actually stabilizes it.

Scrum

29 Jun 2026 · 3 min read

Why Change Management Matters More Than the Plan Itself

Organizations invest heavily in the technical design of a change and comparatively little in managing how people actually move through it. That asymmetry is why most change initiatives fail.

Change Management

27 Jun 2026 · 2 min read

What Good Facilitation Actually Requires

Facilitation is often conflated with running a meeting. The difference shows up most clearly in how a facilitator handles the moments a meeting doesn't go according to plan.

Coaching

22 Jun 2026 · 2 min read

What to Actually Do When Unplanned Work Hits Your Sprint

For many teams, unplanned work is a routine, recurring feature of the work, not an exception. How to handle it without quietly destroying the value of sprint planning.

Scrum

18 Jun 2026 · 2 min read

What Agile Leadership Requires That Traditional Management Doesn't

Agile leadership means enabling rather than directing, which is harder than it sounds for leaders promoted for being good at directing.

Leadership

17 Jun 2026 · 3 min read

What Teal Organizations Actually Get Right (and Where the Model Breaks Down)

Frederic Laloux's Teal model gets treated as more of a finished blueprint than it is. What holds up under scrutiny, and where it needs real adaptation before it survives contact with an actual organization.

Change Management

16 Jun 2026 · 2 min read

What a Team Charter Covers That a Working Agreement Doesn't

A team charter and a working agreement are often used interchangeably. The distinction is worth being precise about: one answers how a team works, the other answers why it exists.

Agile

28 Nov 2025 · 3 min read

Why Team Performance Is Mostly About the Space Between People

Mogens Ejby Villadsen has spent twenty years helping organisations improve how teams work. His central conviction, that performance lives in the interactions between people, not in individual capability, shapes everything he does.

Coaching

Mogens Villadsen

20 Sept 2024 · 2 min read

How a Kanban Board on a Kitchen Wall Renovated Our House on Time and on Budget

Renovating a house with family and friends as your workforce is a coordination challenge that would make most project managers nervous. A 20-minute brainstorm and a wall of sticky notes turned out to be all the management infrastructure needed.

Leadership

Mogens Villadsen

4 Jul 2024 · 2 min read

Six Months Into Your Scaling Initiative, and the Benefits Still Haven't Appeared

A CIO kicks off a major scaling programme. Six months later, the new ceremonies are running, the teams are trained, and the results are... roughly where they were before. This is not an unusual story.

Change Management

Jesper Ørting

4 Jul 2024 · 2 min read

The Agile Disconnect

At Better Change, we understand the immense potential of the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe®) to empower large organisations on their journey towards business agility. Yet, a critical factor often overlooked is leadership's active promotion and embodiment of Agile principles.

Agile

Jesper Ørting

4 Jul 2024 · 2 min read

The Self-Management Mirage: Why Teams Still Struggle

The allure of self-managing teams is undeniable. The promise of empowered, autonomous teams driving innovation and efficiency is a siren song for many organisations. However, the reality can be far less enchanting.

Agile

Jesper Ørting

14 Jun 2024 · 2 min read

SAFe Won't Save You If Your Leaders Aren't Actually Agile

The Scaled Agile Framework is a capable tool for large-scale coordination. But SAFe implementations fail at a predictable rate when the leaders sponsoring them continue to behave in fundamentally un-agile ways. The framework is not the variable. Leadership behaviour is.

Leadership

Jesper Ørting

10 Jun 2024 · 2 min read

When Employees Resist Agile: The Reasons Are More Rational Than You Think

Employee resistance to SAFe and agile transformations is rarely about stubbornness or ignorance. It is a rational response to change that is poorly explained, inadequately supported, and often experienced as something done to people rather than with them.

Agile

Jesper Ørting

10 Jun 2024 · 3 min read

A Modest Manifesto for People Who Actually Change Things

The Agile Manifesto changed how we build software. This Transformation Manifesto is a personal attempt to articulate what actually drives successful organisational change, with apologies to Sutherland and Schwaber for the impertinence.

Coaching

Mogens Villadsen

28 May 2024 · 1 min read

Elevate Your SAFe® By Breaking Down Barriers

In the pursuit of organisational agility, the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe®) above all is thought to offer a roadmap for success. However, when organisations fail to cultivate true cross-functional teams and struggle to minimise hierarchical barriers.

Agile

Jesper Ørting

17 May 2024 · 3 min read

How to Run a Retrospective That Actually Changes Things

Most retrospectives produce a list of actions nobody implements. The problem is usually not effort. It is structure. Here is a five-step approach that turns retrospectives from a ritual into a genuine improvement engine.

Leadership

Mogens Villadsen

20 Mar 2024 · 5 min read

The Art of Effective Decision Making

In today's fast-paced world, making decisions is an essential part of our everyday lives. Whether it's choosing what to have for breakfast or deciding on a career path.

Mogens Villadsen

20 Mar 2024 · 6 min read

The Important Role of Leadership: Why It Matters

Leadership plays a crucial role in organizations of all types and sizes. Effective leadership can have a significant impact on the success and performance of both individuals and teams.

Mogens Villadsen

20 Mar 2024 · 6 min read

Why Do We Use Story Point Estimating?

Story Point Estimating is a widely used technique in the field of project management. By assigning story points to tasks and prioritizing them accordingly, teams can effectively plan and track the progress of their projects.

Mogens Villadsen

23 Feb 2024 · 3 min read

AI Design: The Principles That Shape Every System You Interact With

Every AI system you interact with was shaped by design choices made before deployment. Those choices determine what the system does, how it behaves in edge cases, and how much you can trust its outputs.

AI

Mogens Villadsen

21 Dec 2023 · 5 min read

The Scrum Process Explained

Scrum, a highly popular and effective framework for project management, has revolutionized the way teams collaborate and deliver value. Scrum is an iterative and incremental framework that enables teams to successfully manage complex projects by promoting...

Scrum

Mogens Villadsen

21 Dec 2023 · 3 min read

What Is Change Management? A Practical Guide to Navigating Organisational Transitions

Change management is the structured approach to helping organisations move from their current state to a desired future one. It covers people, processes, and systems, and it fails more often than it succeeds.

Leadership

Mogens Villadsen

13 Dec 2023 · 6 min read

What Is Leadership Development?

Leadership development is a crucial aspect of organizations that aims to cultivate and enhance the leadership qualities of individuals within the company. It involves a systematic approach to identifying potential leaders.

Leadership

Mogens Villadsen

11 Dec 2023 · 6 min read

What Is a Sprint Goal?

A sprint goal is a crucial component of Agile methodology . It provides a clear and concise focus for the team during a sprint, which is a short, time-boxed period for completing a set of tasks .

Agile

Mogens Villadsen

29 Nov 2023 · 6 min read

What is Timeboxing in Scrum?

Timeboxing is a fundamental concept in the Scrum framework that ensures efficient time management and promotes productivity. It involves dividing work into fixed time intervals, known as timeboxes, during which a specific set of tasks must be completed.

Scrum

Mogens Villadsen

31 Oct 2023 · 3 min read

Applying Agile Thinking to Your Own Career (It Works Better Than You'd Think)

Most people manage their careers the way organisations used to manage projects, long planning cycles, limited feedback, changes discovered late. Agile thinking applied to personal development fixes those same weaknesses, with better results.

Agile

Mogens Villadsen

13 Oct 2023 · 2 min read

The Perfect Scrum Team Size

The quest for a high-performing Scrum team often starts with a fundamental question: What is the perfect Scrum team size? It's not just about having the right roles filled.

Scrum

Mogens Villadsen

13 Oct 2023 · 2 min read

What are Acceptance Criteria

In Scrum, the acceptance criteria refer to a set of conditions or requirements that a user story must meet to be considered complete or acceptable by the product owner, user, customer or other stakeholders.

Scrum

Mogens Villadsen

25 Sept 2023 · 2 min read

Agile Governance: Enough Structure to Enable, Not Enough to Control

Governance and agility are widely treated as opposing forces. They are not, but governance designed to control people rather than enable them does undermine agility. The difference matters, and it starts at the top.

Change Management

Mogens Villadsen

3 Apr 2023 · 3 min read

What is Scrum Velocity?

Story points are assigned to user stories or backlog items, which are small, manageable pieces of work that the team commits to completing within a sprint.

Scrum

Mogens Villadsen

2 Sept 2022 · 3 min read

Product Backlog Refinement: The Work That Makes Sprint Planning Possible

Backlog Refinement is the ongoing work that makes Sprint Planning possible. Teams that do it consistently tend to have shorter, more focused planning sessions and fewer mid-Sprint surprises.

Scrum

2 Sept 2022 · 3 min read

The Daily Scrum: Fifteen Minutes That Can Make or Break a Sprint

The Daily Scrum is Scrum's most misunderstood event. Not a status meeting, not three mandatory questions. Done well, it keeps the Sprint on track. Done badly, it is fifteen minutes nobody needs.

Scrum

9 Aug 2022 · 3 min read

The Scrum Board: A Tool for the Team, Not a Reporting Dashboard

A Scrum Board is a visual representation of the Sprint Backlog, the work the team has committed to and where each item currently stands. Used well, it drives the Daily Scrum and keeps the team self-organised.

Scrum

9 Aug 2022 · 3 min read

What Is Agile? Beyond the Buzzword

Agile is one of the most used and least understood terms in modern business. It is not a methodology, not a set of tools, and not a synonym for Scrum.

Agile

Mogens Villadsen